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Tuesday, June 14, 2011

The Four Occupations

Hey there,

As all of you know, it is exam season so the next few post will most likely be very short ones. For those of you who are already done with exams, congratulations! Go out, party, get smashed, or stay at home and finish watching an entire season of something with a tub of ice cream you all deserve it. Dont forget to detoxify your body from all that caffeine as well lol.

I saw a few videos of interviews of Lee Kuan Yew, former prime minister of Singapore, current minister mentor, on YouTube and I have to saw wow. He has such a commanding knowledge in everything, from economics to politics to humanity. Obviously a very well versed man with years of experience and decision making under his belt.

So the interviewer asked him, if you were 20 years old now, what would you do to best equip yourself to face the world. He answered by saying, I would grow up in Singapore because it still provides you with a traditional way of life i.e. traditional Chinese values and with this traditional mind set go out and get a very good education from a well known institution like Harvard, Cambridge or Oxford. I will educate myself well in English and have a good enough knowledge of the Chinese language and culture because English is still worldwide and Chinese will be the economic miracle of the 21st century. (These are not exactly his words but paraphrased)

He then went on to say in traditional Chinese culture, there are four categories of people or four different social classes. In order they are:
Shi (scholars)
Nong (farmers)
Gong (artisans and craftsmen)
Shang (merchants and traders)

The scholars are very highly respected and would often work with the government because to have a good stable country, you need a good stable government.

The merchants and traders had a lower social class because they did not contribute much to society; rather they leach off the work of others by being the middleman.

There you go, one of the wisest men, a man who brought Singapore to what they are today telling us to get a good education as a foundation, think about how you can contribute to society then think about making money by trading.